Pact of Lovers
by Q u e e n V a m p
Summary: The fact that he was going to be Fire Lord some day and she was Princess of the Southern Watertribe, was always going to be over-looked by the pair. /Zutara/


…

THE BEGINNING

…

Reality was something the two lovers never wanted to face.

The fact that he was going to be Fire Lord some day and she was Princess of the Southern Watertribe, was always going to be over-looked by the pair.

Love made them foolish and lust made them reckless.

But not careless.

Their siblings and family never guessed that the two who seemed to be strictly friends could ever be in love.

They were the oddest of pairs.

Him with his alabaster skin, golden eyes and long hair.

Her with her mocha skin, icy eyes and tangle of curls.

They were starred at as they walked down the street together during the long months of summer when she visited him.

They ignored those who watched.

For they did not care.

They just continued talking.

A topic of the day, as they called it.

They were talking about home that day that their relationship fought its first battle.

* * *

"The Fire Nation looks beautiful this time of year…So is the South Pole if a certain prince was brave enough to visit me." Katara nudged Zuko and he looked up at her from his place on the ground. Arms crossed behind his head, half-asleep, face relaxed: the perfect definition of tranquility.

Katara stood clad in a traditional Fire Nation dress with a top that showed a good amount of her stomach and a long, thick material skirt. Her usual blue jewelry was replaced by combs and other bangles that his mother, Lady Ursa, had given her. But her grandmother's chocker stayed clasped around her neck.

The small, blue stone looked odd surrounded by all the red and gold but it highlighted blue of her eyes.

Zuko wasn't sure but he thought there was something different about the infamous necklace, though he hadn't gotten close enough to check yet.

"Well, look who finally changed out of her parka." Katara rolled her eyes and sat down beside him. Bring her knees to her chest and hugging them. Blocking his view of the necklace once more.

"So…would you come visit me?" Katara asked again. Zuko pushed himself upward and gazed into her eyes.

"I thought you preferred coming here. Fun in the sun and all that." Zuko poorly quoted something she'd once said and she smiled a little. "Katara, what's…?"

"Zuko, if I couldn't come here anymore…would you come visit me?"

"Well, yes, of course. But why wouldn't you be able to come here?" Zuko was starting to get worried and Katara's anxiousness wasn't helping.

"Zuko…" Katara sighed and leaned forward, capturing her lover's lips with hers like it was their last time. All the time murmuring his name.

When they broke apart she rested her forehead on his and closed her eyes to stop the tears she didn't want to let fall. Her arms wounded around his neck and tried to pull him in for another kiss, but Zuko stopped her.

"Katara what's wrong?" Katara pulled away from him and then he saw it.

Her necklace.

It wasn't her grandmother's.

This new one was newer, a perfect blue polished stone. Craved into it was an image of a crescent moon entwined with curled waves of water.

In a normal situation Zuko would have asked why she changed her necklace.

But Katara was from the Watertribe and a necklace like this meant…

"You're engaged?"

"My father arranged it…Reno, promised to be a good husband and is a hero of our clan-" Her soft praises were cut off by Zuko's yell.

"You're marrying him!" He jumped to his feet, fire burning behind his golden eyes.

"Zuko…" Katara rose too, everything about her seemed broken. "I don't have a choice."

"Yes you do, you always have a choice." A breath of fire puffed out of his mouth.

She shook her head. "Not this time. Everyone knows and they're all expecting me to. Listen, Zuko," she put her hands on his shoulders and looked up at him. "I tried everything to renounce it, but the Elders won't. And they know I'm here and they're coming for me. To drag me back home for my marriage."

"You can stay here. I have an army at my command…"

"That'll only start war and bloodshed. Your intentions may be to protect me, but someone –on either side- could start a fight and someone could get hurt."

"Katara, you need to…" she cut him off this time. Her hands slid down to one of his and placed it on her chest, where her heart beat was the strongest.

"Zuko, this is my heart and it's breaking every second I think about this." Rare tears started to fall across mocha skin. Zuko stood memorized by the sight of her. "Right now, I need you to hold me and tell it's all going to be okay, even though I know it's not."

Zuko pulled her into him.

"Katara…I love you."

"Please don't…" she pushed on his chest with needless force. "You're only going to make this harder."

Zuko hooked a finger under her chin, forcing her to look at him.

"Katara, Princess of the Southern Watertribe, I'm in love with you." His lips were forceful, imperatively hungrily on hers and he inhaled her gasp of shock, impatiently taking full advantage of her open mouth to slip his tongue in, running it along the warm confines.

All fight in her gone.

She didn't care if Reno was her betrothed she wanted Zuko, only Zuko.

His hand on her chin slipped back towards her hair, getting his figure tangled in her long, dark tress. He pulled her closer into his when he felt her almost inconspicuous movements that brought their lips closer.

* * *

"Does it make it easier knowing I'm marrying a good man?" Katara wondered aloud, Zuko's arms wrapped tighter around her.

"No."

When they finally broke away, she made him agree to come visit her.

But, of course, Zuko had his conditions.

"Do not ever kiss him around me…or show him any sign of affection. I don't want to witness your marriage to another man either."

"That I will agree to…" She pulled away from him and sighed. "You can move on too, Zuko. Marry Mai, she loves you still."

"No,"

"What?"

"I'm trusting there will be a day when you can be my wife." Katara smiled through the pain he was bringing her.

"A Watertribe princess becoming Fire Lady…the Elders's heads will spin."

"You will cause it."

* * *

After that a messenger came saying that a Southern Watertribe's men boat had just docked at the harbor.

Katara left with him and an hour later he and his family were seeing her off. Ursa and her had had taken the longest ime to part, to Katara Ursa had become a second mother to her. Where as Iroh had given her supplies for the trip and his favorite tea, she said she'd probably miss him the most. When she passed by Zuko Katara threw her arms around his and he did the same to her.

"Remember your promise. I'll hold you to it."

Before he could respond she yanked away from him and walked up to the boat where a young man, no older that Zuko, was waiting for her.

Obviously he was her fiancé.

Zuko's will to set free his inner dragon grew stronger as he saw Reno taking Katara's hand to help her up the last step. Once to the top Katara pulled her hand away, glancing back at Zuko and nodding.

The promise, or what they'd now call, the pact started there.

With a simple gesture and Sokka's big mouth telling him the date of the wedding.

He'd set sail the day after the wedding and arrive when the newlyweds were already settled.

* * *

When he'd arrive Zuko would find his lover's (ex-lover's?) new husband upset with the knowledge that she was not pregnant.

"He wants to have children young." Katara said as they walked through the icy village.

Katara's village.

Seeing her in her native born home and clothes only made her seem more beautiful to him. Her long hair was still down in curls but they were much shorter now, reaching just mid-back length.

"Does he now?" Zuko surpressed his shiver and pulled up the hood of his coat.

"Yes, and he was disappointed that I am not pregnant yet."

"Yet?" An angry blush spread across her cheeks.

"Reno has been…um…dragging me into bed…I guess, without a better use of words." Zuko's eyebrows raised high as anger boiled inside him and Katara quickly shook herself. "It's annoying really; I won't fall pregnant if I continue using contraceptive tea herbs..." With a glance at Zuko she realized he didn't understand. "It's a trick woman use so they won't get pregnant. Although they don't grow here so I'll have to make do with the ones Iroh has been shipping over."

"What!"

"Stop shouting, your attracting attention." Katara scolded, letting the water from the pouch she always carries smack his face before settling back in the pouch. "I asked your Uncle Iroh to give me tea leaves that were said to prevent pregnancy and he gave them to be before I left the Fire Nation, he caught on right away that I didn't want Reno's children and sent over more with your ship."

Zuko remembered the box of leaves and the note his uncle had given him before he left the harbor almost a week ago.

"Princess Katara, demands that I shipped these to her. So get on the ship." He laughed at the memory now and smiled at Katara.

"I am a bit confused on how we left things…"

"What do you mean?" Katara made a left turn and Zuko, absentmindedly, followed.

"And we still together or are we 'friends'." Without warning Katara pulled Zuko into a kiss and then Zuko noticed; she had herded him away from the village.

Applying pressure to his lips the two lovers showed each other how much they were missed.

* * *

On the sixth day of winter Katara would bless her village with a prince, on the third year of her marriage to Watertribe's men Reno.

Nine months after another one of her secret lover's visits.

Her son would be known as Azure by the village, for the beautiful blue of his eyes and be called Blue Tiger by his mother, for being the first Firebender born into a Watertribe.

Katara would forever count her blessings that Azure's eyes were blue and that it would take her husband the next thirteen years to find out that his supposed 'son' looked a little too much like the Fire Nation's king.

And that it would take an 'accidental' mix of medicines for Katara to end her son's almost-murder.

And the day he died: Katara and Azure packed their things and set sail to live in the Fire Nation, as Fire Lady and the Fire Nation's prince.

There the Watertribe princess had a long flowing life and remarried to the man she fell in love with from the start.

…

THE END

…

* * *

**Just a fluff I couldn't get out of my head. Sorry if the ends cheesy and if there are mistakes.**

**I have fallen in love (again) with Zutara and I now have a FanFiction account to run it into the ground with. In this Fic Zuko doesn't have his scar and his hair is long.**

**~QueenVamp**


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